No Shepard Without Vakarian
by Luciiraptar
Summary: "There is no Shepard without Vakarian." Post-ME3, Garrus and Tali recollect what has happened to them.


**A/N: Based on Shepard's line in the FOB: "There's no Shepard without Vakarian, so you'd better remember to duck." Also some Tali in here because their relationship is canon and I think they're really sort of adorable together. Read, review. Cameo from OC that will make her way into a post-ME3 fic I have vaguely planned.**

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There is no Shepard without Vakarian, she had said. Shepard had said a lot of things before that last mission. She'd said to remember to duck and, dammit, he had. He ducked and dodged and—hell, his shields were barely scratched until that giant Reaper nearly killed him.

"There is no Shepard without Vakarian." The thing he had to ask himself was, was there a Vakarian without Shepard? They'd been together since the start, with Saren and his geth army. Together, they'd defeated the Collectors, blew up their entire damn base.

They'd survived hordes of hellspawn together—saved the galaxy so many times—

"Garrus."

The turian shifted to acknowledge his lover, pulling Tali into his arms. "Hello, Tali'Zorah." He liked the way her lips, barely visible under her mask, curved up into a smile.

Then she averted her eyes and murmured, "Don't make me happy. I'm too miserable to be happy."

He laughed. "What virus are you making your way through now?"

"The one humans call the 'flu'. Ashley suggested I lay in bed and let you nurse me back to health." Tali rested her head against Garrus's chest. "I'm very glad for the assistance of the geth, but—is sickness always so miserable?"

"Yes," was the turian's reply, chuckling. "How's Ani?"

Tali glanced sideways at the other room, where her young cousin was flopped onto a couch and flicking her way through books, actually paper-and-ink books from Earth. "Well."

"And you?"

Tali bit her lip, glad for the mask for once. She didn't want Garrus to see the pain on her face, but— "I can't help but think. Of Legion, I mean. What he sacrificed. He was a person, Garrus, before the end, and he…"

Tali ran her hands along her lover's arms. "Whenever I—when we talked, he often reverted to one of the questions the geth used to ask my people. 'Does this unit have a soul?' And he did. He did have a soul, and he sacrificed it for the good of his people." Tali looked up. "I was ready to kill him, Garrus. I was ready to kill him and all the geth. And all he wanted was to let his people live in freedom and peace."

Garrus rubbed her shoulders gently. "I've been thinking about something Shepard said to me, before the last fight. In the FOB. She said, 'There is no Shepard without Vakarian.' And I can't help but wonder…"

"If it's the other way around, too." Tali pulled away from Garrus and hugged herself. "We were with her an awfully long time, weren't we? In the beginning, you were just a rogue C-Sec officer. I was just a little girl who was too clever for her own good. And then we became…"

"Great," Garrus finished after a second of silence. "Thanks to her, mostly. You probably would've done fine in the flotilla—you always were good with ships and technology—but I would've died on Omega if it wasn't for Shepard coming along and saving my life."

Tali shook her head. "Remember that thing with my… with my father? I would have been exiled. And it probably wouldn't have taken much longer after that. Like it or not, Vakarian, she's saved all of us in one way or another. She made us all in one way or another. Ash would have died on Eden Prime without her. Wrex would have been a bounty hunter until one of his jobs killed him. Mordin would have sought redemption until his past mistakes killed him…"

"I get your point," Garrus interrupted, nuzzling where her forehead would be if she wasn't wearing her suit. She could be out of it for short times, now, in the safety of their own home, but she preferred to stay in it out of habit. "But back to my original question. Shepard and I have been best friends for so long. I've pulled her ass out of so many fires—and she's saved me her fair share of times as well—and we both helped each other evolve. I used to be much angrier, you know."

"I know," Tali murmured.

Garrus nodded slowly. "And we've been saving the galaxy for so long. What am I supposed to do now that everything's peaceful? It's just so… peaceful."

"We settle down." Tali shrugged. "We ask forgiveness. We look for ourselves. We ask Liara if she wants to be a surrogate, or find another asari willing."

Garrus gave her a strange look. "You want to have asari children?"

Tali shifted into a more challenging posture. "Do you want to get in an argument over whether we should adopt quarian or turian children, Garrus?"

The veteran soldier looked down at the slight alien nervously. "I see your point. Asari daughter. But you're going to be the father. I want her to have your kindness."

Tali smiled and hugged Garrus. "We're going to have to get married first. I think we should—we should have a human ceremony. In honor of Shepard."

The turian nodded. "Unconventional. I like it. And I have a feeling that Shepard will, too. Wherever she is."

"And," the quarian added, "there is a Vakarian without Shepard. And I know that because you're standing here, talking with me about children and marriage, and she's somewhere out there. Watching us. Of course," she hastened to add, "I'm sure she looks away when we…"

Garrus laughed. "Oh, I'm sure she does. Tali." He suddenly lifted her mask and kissed her lips quickly before settling the mask firmly over her features again. "And don't you worry about Legion at all, Tali. You were just doing what you thought was best for your people, just like he was trying to do what was best for his. He understood, and you answered him before the end."

Tali looked up at him, removing her mask and setting it aside so he could see what she chose to show: Her tear-filled eyes and perfectly unattractive face, which was currently suffering the effects of her immune system fighting a nonexistent virus. "Do you think so, Garrus?"

"Yes." He leaned down and kissed her forehead. "And wherever Legion is—up with Shepard or somewhere else—he's happy for you and us."

Tali nodded slowly. "Okay, then." She took a deep breath, glancing outside, to beautiful Rannoch. The world that she would have been glad to share with Legion. "Well. You call Liara. I'll find a priest. This is going to happen as soon as possible, Vakarian."

Garrus chuckled. "You're hot when you're determined, Tali." But he went off to call Liara to ask her an extremely awkward question, because he loved Tali, and because he finally knew that he had a future with kids and a wife and an annoying cousin who he still loved to pieces.

There was a Vakarian without Shepard, and he was going to continue, even if Shepard couldn't.


End file.
